A super-stellar lineup, including Oprah Winfrey, Robert De Niro, Nicole Kidman, and Reese Witherspoon—plus, one special cameo—took advantage of their downtime during the shoot of a historic V.F. cover.

In the quarter-century since Vanity Fair launched the Hollywood Issue, show business has changed in fundamental ways, as have magazines. But a star-studded, foldout cover remains a surefire thrill. This year’s portfolio goes inside the cover’s creation, which took place in L.A. and New York as Annie Leibovitz photographed 12 of film and TV’s most iconic actors—with a non-actor corralled for the shoot for his last V.F. hurrah.

Photograph by Annie Leibovitz.

The films and TV shows represented by the actors in this year’s Hollywood Portfolio—which for the first time offers a behind-the-scenes look at the shoot—took the #MeToo movement in stride, offering strong women in leading roles, as well as strong men supporting them. Here we have Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman summoning the women’s battle cry of Big Little Lies alongside Tom Hanks as Ben Bradlee, the indispensable sidekick to The Post heroine Katharine Graham. There’s also Claire Foy and Gal Gadot, embodiments of their formidable characters, the Queen and Wonder Woman, and one possible future female president in the mix. Movies have always thrived on relevance, and this year’s cover stars don’t hesitate to make a statement about the times we’re living in and the changes that need to happen.

ROBERT DE NIRO, actor, producer, director.

It is impossible to determine which is more intimidating: Robert De
Niro’s scowl, which in his gangster roles signals a beatdown about to
ensue (see GoodFellas), or his jack-o’-lantern smile, which indicates
he’s going to relish the beatdown about to ensue (see his Al Capone in
The Untouchables). Violence isn’t the only language his characters
speak, but it is the one in which they are most articulate, especially
in the collaborations with Martin Scorsese, which began with Mean
Streets and continue today with The Irishman (Netflix), co-starring,
among others, Al Pacino (as Jimmy Hoffa!), Joe Pesci, Harvey Keitel, and
Bobby Cannavale—ya gotta problem with that?

HARRISON FORD, actor, producer.

Amazing how far Harrison Ford’s cocky, goofball grin has traveled since
he hot-rodded down the main drag in American Graffiti, a grin that would
forge a conspiratorial pact with audiences worldwide. Ford’s space
jockey, Han Solo, in the Star Wars saga, and whip-cracking Indiana Jones
were—and are—joyous throwbacks to the movie serials of lore, their
boyish zeal unextinguished by age, gray, and grizzle. Ford also took on
mortal danger with a straight mug as Jack Ryan (Patriot Games, Clear and
Present Danger), the replicant terminator in Blade Runner, and Dr. Richard Kimble in The Fugitive.

MICHAEL B. JORDAN, actor.

12 films, including Black Panther (2018).

After appearing in a multitude of television series (most impactfully in
The Wire), Michael B. Jordan had his big-screen moment of arrival in
Ryan Coogler’s Fruitvale Station, a haunter of a film based on a
real-life tragedy that illustrated why Black Lives Matter. Since then,
Jordan has muscled up into the heavyweight division, literally in Creed
and figuratively as Erik Killmonger, not a name to trifle with, in
Coogler’s insanely anticipated rollout of the Marvel superhero Black
Panther.

ZENDAYA, actor, singer.

Another Disney sensation who has gone mainstream massive, Zendaya—star
of the Disney Channel’s K. C. Undercover—has zapped the sweet spot in
pop culture where entertainment, fashion, and social media meet and
cross-pollinate. She glammed down to play a dorky misfit in Spider-Man:
Homecoming, then twirled up to loop the air as a trapeze artist in The
Greatest Showman, as if to say, “Why should Spidey get to do all the
swinging?”

MICHAEL SHANNON, actor, musician.

Everything Michael Shannon is in, he intensifies. As the lawman in Nocturnal Animals, Shannon was an avenging angel in a white Stetson hat;
in the keenly anticipated mini-series Waco, a docudrama depicting the
siege of the Branch Davidian compound, Shannon’s resolute F.B.I.
negotiator faces off against a crackpot messiah (Taylor Kitsch’s David
Koresh); and in 12 Strong, he and Chris Hemsworth take on the Taliban.
Small or big, there’s no theater of conflict he can’t command.

Annie sets up the first panel of the cover, with Oprah Winfrey, Tom Hanks, and Reese Witherspoon.

Photograph by Kathryn MacLeod.

Photograph by Kathryn MacLeod.

OPRAH WINFREY, actor, producer, philanthropist.

Oprah enrings the earth. Television host, author, producer, magazine
publisher, powerhouse actress (The Color Purple, Beloved, Lee Daniels’
The Butler, Selma, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks), influencer
without equal, and the first black woman to win the Golden Globes’ Cecil
B. DeMille Award, Winfrey is more than the sum of her accomplishments—she’s a gravitational field that doesn’t press down
but lifts up. Everything she does is dedicated to betterment without
being didactic or, worse, corny. Will Oprah’s next act be a presidential
bid?

Photograph by Kathryn MacLeod.

Oprah, Reese, and Tom convene.

Photograph by Kathryn MacLeod.

TOM HANKS, actor, producer.

The unfussy integrity, mission resolve, and cool-in-a-crisis humor of Hanks’s Everyman heroes are among Hollywood’s last lingering reminders
that we were once a proud democracy, and may still be again. His
characters are animated by duty and the common good, not personal glory
or Ahab obsession. Whether piloting Apollo 13 back to Mother Earth,
Saving Private Ryan, or guiding a planeful of passengers safely onto the
drink in Sully, Hanks keeps everything human-scaled and emotionally
relatable. In The Post, a sure Oscar contender, he is once again
thwarting the forces of suppression and deceit, portraying The
Washington Post’s leonine executive editor Benjamin Bradlee, the role
Jason Robards rasped into Oscar glory in All the President’s Men. Let
the presses thunder!

Gal gets a touch-up.

Photograph by Kathryn MacLeod.

GAL GADOT, actor, model.

Physically, the Israeli actress, model, and former Israel Defense Forces
combat trainer Gal Gadot brought all the right attributes—imposing
height and beauty, athleticism, goddessy glamour—to the task of
playing Princess Diana, daughter of Hippolyta, better known around the
neighborhood as Wonder Woman. But it was a secret power Gadot unsheathed
that won the day: charm. In a blockbuster season with so little fun to
be had, Gadot’s exuberant high spirits (and Patty Jenkins’s direction)
redeemed the DC franchise from its male-menopausal funk. The rest of the
Justice League should turn in their trunks.

Tom entertains Oprah and Reese.

Photograph by Matthias Gaggl.

REESE WITHERSPOON, actor, producer.

Fresh from the starting gate, Reese Witherspoon radiated poignant yearning in The Man in the Moon. Only 15 at the time, Witherspoon was a
natural on-screen, but a lot of naturals turn unnatural with time; not
our Reese. Her special gift is for clear carbonated comedy, most
memorably as Legally Blonde’s Elle Woods, whose bunny fluff conceals a
snap-crackle-and-pop brain. Rom-coms aplenty followed, girded by
dramatic triumphs: country madonna June Carter in Walk the Line and
scary momster Madeline Martha Mackenzie in HBO’s smash mini-series Big
Little Lies.

Nicole Kidman on set.

Photograph by Kathryn MacLeod.

NICOLE KIDMAN, actor, producer.

66 films, including Boy Erased (2018); one Academy Award.

No matter how many gutsy dives Nicole Kidman takes from the high board
in her choices of adventurous roles, directors, and projects (in this
decade alone, The Paperboy, The Beguiled, The Killing of a Sacred Deer),
the entertainment press insists on propping her on an ivory pedestal and
harping on her frosty reserve. More fools they. As an actor, Kidman has
never hesitated to get down in the funk. She brought the body heat to
Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut, her maternal agon in Birth remains an
undiscovered wonder, and she was outright freaky-deaky in The Paperboy.
Conquering TV with an Emmy-and Golden Globe-winning splash in HBO’s Big
Little Lies, Kidman could rest on her laurels but won’t. This Kid don’t
quit.

GRAYDON CARTER, journalist, producer.

CLAIRE FOY, actor.

7 films, including Unsane (2018); 16 television shows, including The Crown, Season Two (2017).

Quintessential Englishness is the viola Claire Foy plays, usually in
period costume. Foy was outfitted with the poshy title of Lady
Persephone Towyn in the remake of Upstairs, Downstairs (BBC), lost her
head as Anne Boleyn on Wolf Hall (BBC), and was reconstituted for
greatness as Queen Elizabeth II on The Crown (Netflix), contending with
a moody husband, a lumbering Winston Churchill, a sprawling empire, and
the deadweight of protocols and precedents—all while maintaining
cameo-brooch composure. In royalty, as in theater, the show must go on.